After restoring from backup following filesystem corruption my user account hangs after login (After entering my password the login window disappears and all I get is the background and a mouse pointer, no spinning wheel of death etc ..) I can login as a different user and then logout and login as my main account (sometimes!) but this is not consistant.

I can login with safemode ok and have tried deleting /System/Caches, ~/Library/Caches and removing all my ~/Library/Preferences which worked once but not again.

Does anyone have an any idea which logs I can look in, if any, to see whats happening after login or any other tips?

2 Answers
2

If it works in safe mode, you should check the things that get disabled in safe mode. Since this problem only occurs in the login session, the prime suspects are probably login items (check in System Preferences -> Accounts -> your account -> Login Items tab), LaunchAgents (check both /Library/LaunchAgents at the root of the boot drive, and ~/Library/LaunchAgents in your home folder; note that items in /System/Library/LaunchAgents are not disabled in safe mode, so aren't suspects), and fonts (again, check both /Library/Fonts and ~/Library/Fonts). Experiment with disabling the various items to narrow down which one's causing the problem.

If the problem is specific to the login items, one could just login with Shift held down (support.apple.com/kb/TA20716) instead of doing a whole safe boot. If it still fails, then try a safe boot. If it works, then one only has to check the login items instead of all the stuff a full safe boot disables.
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Chris JohnsenJan 16 '10 at 17:35